Nokia

As per one of the leading unlocked cell phone blog site, Redbox clarified rumors that they were planning to launch a streaming Netflix competitor later this year. CEO of Coinstar, the company that owns Redbox, confirmed that the service was in the works last year during an earnings call, but did not elaborate on how it would operate or how soon users could expect to use the service. He also did not have any information regarding the pricing model that would be employed with the new service.

Lowe confirmed today that the new service will be a subscription service in the same way that Netflix is run. No further information regarding exact pricing was given. At this point in time, Redbox runs unmanned DVD rental machines that allow users to rent a movie for one dollar per night. These kiosks are usually stocked with the latest new releases in an effort to compete with video rental stores.

Redbox did not reveal whether or not they had a partner for their upcoming streaming service, but it is assumed that they could not operate a subscription based streaming service without first partnering with a company that has the hardware to back up the operation.

Redbox is looking to directly compete with Netflix, after easily taking hold of the movie rental market. With Blockbuster, Hollywood Video, and other movie rental companies struggling to stay afloat with high rent prices, Redbox was ahead of the game when they launched the unmanned do it yourself kiosks that have become highly popular in recent years. It will be interesting to see how well RedBox will be able to compete with Netflix, which has already established themselves as the leader in the streaming market after cutting deals with all of the major console gaming systems, allowing gamers to link right up with their library of streaming movies and play them directly through the console platform.

The unlocked iPhone 4 app store certainly is not suffering from a small amount of Twitter clients. In fact, the app store seems to be littered with so many Twitter clients that it can be hard to sift through them all and find one that suits your needs. However, there is a new Twitter application that might be a little bit hard for some die hard gaming suers to pass up.

The application, from NamcoBandai was released in Japan and is called Pac’N TWIT. The application is a Japanese Pac-Man playable game that also allows you to access the Twitter features while you play. This should allow you to effectively pass some time while using the app. It is currently free, and is also translated into both English and French, but is currently only available in the Japanese App store. If the app finds a good amount of popularity, you can expect it to bridge the gap to the app stores of other languages as well.

At the very least it is a refreshing take on Twitter clients, which have run rampant in recent months. The ability to play Pac Man (and supposedly soon, other games) while you use Twitter will help you to pass time while keeping up with all of your followers and followees. Pac-Man recently saw resurgence in popularity when Google made a version playable on their homepage, in place of their usual location of their logo. The game was one of the most searched terms online for over a week, and it became clear tat there is a huge demand for apps that support Pac-Man play, even though the game, at this point, is more than 30 years old.

If the app does well in the Japanese app store, which it is expected to, then you will find that the app may quickly expand to other app stores as well.

The Nokia Chatr C3 has seen its price drop for the first time since the phone was first released. The phone will now be available for just &88 without a contract in Best Buy locations across North America. The purchase will also include a Bluetooth Headset, which will save you $12 since you made the purchase directly through Chatr.

The service also recently changed their pricing structure on place for six months. These plans will now only cost $25 and $35 per month, dropping a total of $10 since the device was first released.

The Unlocked Nokia (C3) at Chatr has not been all that popular of a phone since it was first released, but has received rave reviews. The phone allows you to get both Facebook and Twitter updates right on the home screen of your phone and has a unique picture-calling feature that allows you to click on the face or picture of those that you would like to call or text instead of having to go through the contact list options to make all of the calls.

As with many smart phones, the Nokia C3 will also allow you to email, chat and place music on the hard drive for later listening. The size of the screen is just 2.4 inches and has a resolution of 320 x 240. It has been a quite popular phone because of its affordability and ease of use for consumers who were not looking to shell out the money for a top of the line smart device. It will be interesting to see if the price of the Nokia C3 from Chatr continues to drop any lower. This is the first time that we have seen the price fall, but one would not go as far as to say that the price drop was unexpected by those that were following the life of the phone.

Are you a fan of the Firefox browser on Android devices? If so, then you might be interested in giving test driving the fourth version of Firefox for Android machines such as HTC Desire unlocked, Samsung Captivate i897, etc. Keep in mind that Firefox may not be the most popular - or most stable browser for the devices, but it has managed to garner a huge following that swear by it.

Mozilla knows that the data networks bottlenecking and adding extra seconds onto loading time is a big deal for most consumers who have grown accustomed to instant gratification when searching the web. They have toned down on the heaviness of their previous Firefox releases with Firefox 4, and have made the newest release completely about an increase in speed. They claim that the newest build of the browser will allow you to surf the web over three times faster than it did before. This information was obtained using the Kraken Javascript Benchmark, which is actually built by Mozilla so the results might be a little skewed, but it is good to see that Mozilla is focusing mostly on speed in the same way that Chrome did when it first came out.

In the SunSpider test, which is a more popular platform that is not designed by Mozilla, Firefox 4 tends to be about twice as fast as the previous versions. Of course, you probably won’t notice the split second difference unless you are using Firefox 4 during heavily trafficked times of the day.

Mozilla has also passed a total of 100 add on for mobile devices, which exponentially increases the feature list of the browser. Bringing their famous add-ons to their mobile browser is something that has attracted many of their desktop users that missed the functionality that they were used to having on their desktops. Some of these add ons include Ad Block Plus and User Agent Switcher, both of which are already stable and are running without any major issues according to tests and user reports thus far.

Reports about unlocked cell phones with projectors have run rampant in recent years. The first reports were first seen in October 2008. These reports stated that developers were already working on a design that would bring a mobile device with a built in projector to Japan in the coming months. This project has taken a little bit longer than expected, but Japan’s biggest mobile carrier, NTT Docomo announced today that they would be offering the new handset with built in projection starting on Friday.

It will be the first phone that allows users to project images on to wall and screens, and could be the start of a revolution in the mobile industry. The device, which is called the Sharp SH-06 will feature a 3.7 inch touchscreen that features a 480x854 resolution. The device will also feature a prjector that has nine lumens of brightness and a 640x360 resolution, allowing you to quickly and easily share online videos with friends without having to pass the phone around.

As you might imagine, the phone will also come with a OneSeg digital TV tuner, which seems to make a lot of sense and will go along nicely with the projector. The device will also have Blu-Ray record connectivity, allowing users to project Blu-Ray images through the projector.

Along with the projector, the Sharp SH-06 will feature a 5.3 mega pixel CMOS camera, completely with auto-focus, that will allow you to take high quality photos. At just 137 grams, you would really expect the first handset with built in projection to weight substantially more in order to house the technology. If this turns out to be a hit in Japan, you can expect companies to quickly make plans to bring the technology to the US sometime thereafter. This is one feature that all mobile enthusiasts should keep their eye on.

Information is pointing to Nokia offering their E6-00 smart device including an 8 megapixel camera and a keypad, to be announced in February at MWC in February. So far, there is no concrete evidence to suggest that the rumor is true. There is no leaked picture of the device, and all we have to go off of so far is just a render of the device.

However, an XML file was found on the Nokia website that suggests that the device will run on a CGA display with 640 x 480 resolution display, complete with WiFi, HSDPA and will also run on an ARM processor on the Symbian operating system. You can bet that it will be at least Symbian^3 or a newer version of the operating system.

The Unlocked Nokia phone ( E6-00 ) is also likely going to boast an eight megapixel camera that comes complete with LED flash and a full QWERTY keyboard for optimal communication. Some experts have also suggested that the newest version could be slightly larger than the Nokia E5, which was pretty small.

Fans are looking forward to an official announcement, since all there is to go off right now is hearsay and some information that was scraped from the Nokia website via an XML file. Although this information usually turns out to be true, who knows when the XML file was originally created and what changes they have made to their plans.

It will be interesting to see if the information that has been found turns out to be true. It will likely be formally introduced during the MWC in February in Barcelona, where those that opted out of making announcements during the Consumer Electronics Show will be announcing their newest technology and smart devices. Nokia usually stays fairly quiet about these things until an official announcement is made, so do not expect anything right away.

ViewSonic announced their newest smart phone on Thursday. The new unlocked cell phone, the Viewpad 4, will be added to their line of great ViewPad phones. Currently, there is already the ViewPad 7 and 10 tablets that have gained quite a bit of attention in recent months. The ViewPad 4, like the previous models in the line, will be a tablet but will have smart phone functionality as well.

The ViewPad 4 will have a 4.1 inch WVGA display, as well as a 1 GHz processor from Snapdragon. It will be able to record high quality 720p HD video and will also feature playback support. Along with an HDMI out port, a feature that has become the highlight of many new phone announcements and a 5 megapixel camera, the Viewpad 4 is a device that is loaded with excellent features.

It is expected to be released sometime in the second or third quarter of 2011. So far, no pricing information has been released. They did announce that the carriers would be responsible for the pricing of the device, although the company did not name which carriers those might be.

This addition to their ViewPad line will give consumers a cheaper option with a smaller screen if they do not want to have to deal with the higher priced models in the ViewPad line. The fact that the device will have full cellular support is another huge draw and should garner them a lot of viewers. Although it is considered to be a tablet, the ViewPad 4 is more the size of a large smart phone, complete with all of the features that you would expect a cellular device to have. It will run on the Android 2.2 Froyo software, an operating system that many tablets that were announced during the Consumer Electronics Show will be running on.

LG has set their sights high for 2011. Currently, they are the third largest device manufacturer in the world, only behind Unlocked Nokia Phone and Samsung, but that hasn’t stopped them from making an attempt to get to the top spot. They were able to ship out more than seven million smart devices in 2010, and they are looking to more than quadruple that number with their various offerings in 2011. The target number that they outlined during a press event was 30 million, a huge leap from the number of smart devices that they were able to ship last year.

The Mobile Vice President of the Company, Ma Chang-Min said that they were looking to improve the number of high quality smart devices that they were offering this year, and also release phones for budget minded consumers that are not looking to invest in the latest technology.

LG unlocked phone looks to grow the number of phones that they offer as well as the features that are encompassed with these phones. With a lot of attention being placed on upcoming phones like the Optimus Black, which has been highly anticipated and well reviewed, it looks as if the company is getting off on the right foot this time around.

Although they have a long way to go to meet the 30 million mark that Chang-Min announced today, it wouldn’t be all that surprising if they were able to hit it. The number of phones that the company has on tap for 2011 is a huge list, and with the quality that they provide you can expect a few of them to take off in popularity fairly quickly. It remains to be seen if they will hit their 30 million mark, but at least they are setting their sights high and continually trying to gain ground in the ever-changing mobile market.

HTC is a company that is known for delivering excellent mobile devices to their customers, but also has not attracted as much attention as some of the other companies within the same space. Now, it appears that the company will be making the official unveiling of their new HTC Scribe tablet device at the MWC in February. A number of sources close to the company have said that they will be making the announcement about their 7 inch screen tablet in Barcelona in February. Some have already speculated that the tablet device will be more popular broad than it will here in the states, but that doesn’t mean that it couldn’t rise to popularity in the west as well.

The HTC Scribe will reportedly run the Android 3.0 software, a few ticks below the latest version. This information was reportedly leaked by the Taiwanese parts manufacturer that has been working with HTC unlocked phones to build the device over the course of the last few months.

HTC is known for being a company that was one of the first to utilize the Android operating system for their devices, and in some instances can even be credited with helping Android rise to the popularity that it has now. HTC has yet to develop a tablet device and the Scribe will be the first offering by the company.

Although it won’t be as feature loaded as the PlayBook and other tablets that are set to hit the market here soon, the Scribe is expected to be one of the most popular tablet choices on the market as soon as it is released. HTC hopes to snatch up niche markets of users that are looking to find a tablet that will allow them to browse Flash websites, a feature that is missing from the iPad.

Virgin will be releasing the popular “Project” magazine application for free to all of their unlocked cell phone users during the Christmas season. The application, which usually costs $2.99 will be available for download. The magazine, which Virgin has called a “revolutionary multimedia magazine” allows users to browse from one page to another through the application, opting to move away from the standard paper magazines that we traditionally read. The magazine comes complete with cover shots and all of the advertisements and full page photos that you would expect from a regular magazine.

The information in the app is updated on a daily basis. They focus their journalism efforts on international culture, design, and entertainment. In one recent cover of the magazine, Jeff Bridges is pictured in a story about his upcoming “Tron” movie.

The magazine has quickly increased in popularity in recent years and has continually attempted to change the way that magazine reading is viewed. They focus on providing smart, readable articles that deliver the information to the reader in an interesting way. Many of the pieces in the magazine have a slight-opinionated feel to them, which only adds to the fact that it is more entertaining to read, because you feel strongly about most of the editorial pieces.

This is a deal that you ca not miss if you are looking for solid information on international topics that are encompassed by culture, entertainment and travel. As Project continues to grow in size, you can bet that they will not have a deal this good again any time soon, so its best that you take advantage of it when you have the opportunity.